db_connect: Could not connect to paper db at "wotug@dragon.kent.ac.uk"
db_connect: Could not connect to paper db at "wotug@dragon.kent.ac.uk"
%T Programming the CELL\-BE using CSP
db_connect: Could not connect to paper db at "wotug@dragon.kent.ac.uk"
%A Kenneth Skovhede, Morten N. Larsen, Brian Vinter
db_connect: Could not connect to paper db at "wotug@dragon.kent.ac.uk"
%E Peter H. Welch, Adam T. Sampson, Jan Bækgaard Pedersen, Jon Kerridge, Jan F. Broenink, Frederick R. M. Barnes
%B Communicating Process Architectures 2011
%X The current trend in processor design seems to focus on
using multiple
cores, similar to a cluster\-on\-a\-chip
model. These processors are
generally fast and power
efficient, but due to their highly parallel
nature, they are
notoriously difficult to program for most scientists.
One
such processor is the CELL broadband engine (CELL\-BE) which
is known
for its high performance, but also for a complex
programming model which
makes it difficult to exploit the
architecture to its full potential. To
address this
difficulty, this paper proposes to change the
programming
model to use the principles of CSP design, thus
making it simpler to
program the CELL\-BE and avoid
livelocks, deadlocks and race conditions.
The CSP model
described here comprises a thread library for
the
synergistic processing elements (SPEs) and a simple
channel based
communication interface. To examine the
scalability of the
implementation, experiments are performed
with both scientific
computational cores and synthetic
workloads. The implemented CSP model
has a simple API and is
shown to scale well for problems with
significant
computational requirements.